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There’s this concept called “catastrophizing”, where basically you take whatever situation you’re in and project it out to worst case, and then feel anxious bec

There’s this concept called “catastrophizing”, where basically you take whatever situation you’re in and project it out to worst case, and then feel anxious because there’s a looming catastrophe. E.g. you and your partner have a disagreement about housework. This then gets projected to worst case - they’ll never carry their weight/stop trying to micromanage my behavior, ergo I don’t know if this relationship can work. This comic seems aimed at tone-deaf people trying to get others to stop catastrophizing, and there’s a whole lot to be said for validating others’ experience (life is inescapably and terribly painful) and not trying to cram zen shit down people’s throats when they’re suffering. It’s not helpful. In addition to that, unless you’re literally falling off a cliff, falling off of a cliff is a disempowering metaphor - it’s straight catastrophizing. If you’re literally and inescapably about to get hit by a semi truck, well. Why shouldn’t you focus on what you can control? Why not think warm thoughts about the people you love before you die? Our brains generate lots of crazy, irrational things when we’re in pain. That’s inescapable - we don’t really control our thoughts. We do get to reality test them and choose whether or not to believe those thoughts, though.

free_rms 6y ago
There's people out there with a lot of economic insecurity plus kids with no school right now, it's not 'catastrophizing' for them to feel like they're drowning.
- lhuser123 6y ago
  Exactly. Sometimes the catastrophe is real. And is difficult for outsiders to understand the magnitude of it.
katzgrau 6y ago
That's really what Stoicism is all about - control what you can, accept what you cannot. That doesn't mean that you will be immune from suffering, but it frames our problem in a rational way and sometimes makes them more tolerable. People have been thinking about approaches to the same everyday problems for thousands of years.
OJFord 6y ago
> This comic seems aimed at tone-deaf people trying to get others to stop catastrophizing Funny, my read was that the author is on the side of the catastrophisor, 'this is what your unsolicited advice looks like - you don't understand what a catastrophe the recipients in'. Nobody ever gets a chance to give advice to someone falling off a cliff or getting hit by a truck. Isn't it the comic itself (at least) that's doing the catastrophising?
- roflc0ptic 6y ago
  Totally agree. The comic is straight catastrophizing.
dplgk 6y ago
Thanks for this explanation. I have a tendency to do this and I'm not sure if it's from being a programmer, where predicting a cascading effect from a single decision is very useful... Or if I'm a good programmer because I already had this tendency. It's not great for relationships.
- Hnrobert42 6y ago
  I also tend to jump straight into solution mode. I found it useful to study and practice mirroring. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirroring https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirroring
- TeMPOraL 6y ago
  A similar "programmer tendency" I struggle with that's also not great for relationships is inventing counterexamples. It's a very powerful tool of reasoning - for a candidate solution/idea, you quickly come up with some corner cases and use them to fix the idea or abort it and search for a better one. But in relationships, it leads to exchanges like: - Her: You know, maybe let's start doing X to improve Y? - Me: Yeah, that's a good idea! But let's also talk about handling Z because without it, X will lead to less Y. - Her: [confused] Why do you hate my ideas? - Me: [confused] What? I just said I think the idea is great, it just needs a bit more consideration. And then she's sad, and I'm confused, and X never happens. Despite trying to phrase my counterexamples in a very constructive way (instead of how we do it in industry: "but Z!"), they're being perceived as a rejection. After couple of such I've finally learned to keep track of the corner cases in my head, accept the idea without the mentioning it, and only then, over time, bring up the counterexamples so that it's clear these are new problems to be solved, and not a rejection.
  - codemonkey-zeta 6y ago
    Wow this resonates with me so much. I deal with the _exact_ same problem in my relationship. I've also come to the same conclusion that I simply cannot discuss the counterexamples in the moment of ideation, because it always discourages my SO. It's challenging because it's this exact quality that I feel makes me a strong programmer, and it's extremely difficult to "turn it off" when other people's feelings are involved. I do think many people attach emotional value to their ideas, and any perceived imperfections invalidate the idea as a whole. I don't have any evidence of this that might generalize, but personally I feel like I (and potentially many programmers) never attach _any_ emotional value to my ideas, because if I did then every single bug I face in my code would be a defeat rather than an opportunity to learn and grow.
maxerickson 6y ago
It's generally just not necessary to give people unsolicited advice. Even more so to people that you don't know well. You are overthinking the metaphors in the comic. They are just there to emphasize that the advice isn't doing the person receiving it any good (or is your premise that the person about to get hit by the semi will suddenly act differently having been encouraged to focus on the things they can control?).
- Hnrobert42 6y ago
  I agree with your points. At the same time, I sm tickled by the irony of you giving unsolicited advice about not giving unsolicited. :-)
  - maxerickson 6y ago
    It could be worse. I commented on the necessity of it rather than making an active statement (Don't or you shouldn't or…), and there's no speculation about how the other poster acts.
    - roflc0ptic 6y ago
      Nah, I don't think it really qualifies as advice, just seems like sharing your perspective. Hypocrisy averted!
    - Hnrobert42 6y ago
      No worries. I didn’t think it was bad. Just amusing in a meta kind of way.
- roflc0ptic 6y ago
  My position is that giving bad advice is bad, giving unsolicited advice is usually bad, and that "there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so", which is to say that - when something painful happens, we suffer doubly by assigning a bunch of meaning to it and worrying about it. Even though telling an individual who is catastrophizing to stop catastrophizing usually won't help them stop (and will often damage relationships), it is nevertheless the case that they'll be better off if they stop catastrophizing. I took the time to write this here because it struck me that the people who would identify with this comic might benefit from the concept, and in a small way, hope that they can apply it to their lives to suffer a little bit less. Better than giving unsolicited advice is gently sharing mental models that you think might serve a person better, and letting them make the choice to adopt them (or not).
techbio 6y ago
Catastrophizing, meet your neighbor Ridiculizing.
Dumblydorr 6y ago
It's not zen to cram shitty aphorisms down someone's ears when they aren't even asking. Zen is about sitting, focusing on the current moment, and using simple stories and imagery from zen tradition to improve your mind. Zen is not foisting your egotistically driven ideas onto others who aren't receptive.
- roflc0ptic 6y ago
  Fair. I should have put "zen" in quotes. I'm involved with a Plum Village inspired sangha, and have experienced my share of well intentioned, unhelpful and unsolicited advice from buddhists (who are genuinely lovely people).
guerrilla 6y ago
I think you missed the point and as a consequence this comment is exactly the kind of advice the comics apply to. We need another panel with someone being stabbed repeatedly and a person advising them to "just stop catastrophizing" The point is that the situation is out of the person's control and is catastrophic. This is an assumption of the setup. This is distinct from the experience of the situation which is painful. Denial that the situation is out of the person's control and is not catastrophic is just handwaving it away, which is unsurprisingly not helpful. > unless you’re literally falling off a cliff [...] it’s straight catastrophizing. This is nonsense. There are plenty of examples of things that are horrible to experience and outside of the person's control and for them this kind of advice is absurd. For example, depression and mental illness. This goes for many kinds of physical illnesses as well. I suspect that may be where the author is coming from too. The implication of the comics is that the grave situation is actually real and actually uncontrollable which the sufferer actually knows as a fact. > Why shouldn’t you focus on what you can control? Why not think warm thoughts about the people you love before you die? The question is not whether they should but whether they can. There's no indication in the comics that the situations are not literally uncontrollable, only that the adviser is unaware of this fact.
- roflc0ptic 6y ago
  > There are plenty of examples of things that are horrible to experience and outside of the person's control and for them this kind of advice is absurd Let's say e.g. someone's father gets dementia, and they've got to take care of them. They talk about how painful it is, and you feel like you've been thrown off of a cliff. Seeing that they're in a lot of pain, I try to help by saying "Look, you just need to focus on the things that you can control. Using metaphors like that is disempowering." We both agree that this would be a terrible way to help. Watching someone you love die of dementia is a horrible experience. If someone is expressing dismay at the prospect of watching a loved one uncontrollably disintegrate, the only good responses are in the vein of "wow, that sounds incredibly painful. Let me know if there's anything I can do to help." Nevertheless! The person whose father is dying has a choice about where they put their attention. Do they spend time thinking about how unfair it is for him to work his whole life and lose his mind the moment he's poised to retire? How unfair it is that they have to take care of this person, who never took care of them when they were younger? Or instead, do they focus on the things that they can influence? I'm not saying it's easy to do - personally I find it incredibly difficult. But making the effort to calmly accept things as they are without labeling things as catastrophes has been and continues to be incredibly freeing.

free_rms 6y ago

There's people out there with a lot of economic insecurity plus kids with no school right now, it's not 'catastrophizing' for them to feel like they're drowning.

lhuser123 6y ago
Exactly. Sometimes the catastrophe is real. And is difficult for outsiders to understand the magnitude of it.

katzgrau 6y ago

That's really what Stoicism is all about - control what you can, accept what you cannot. That doesn't mean that you will be immune from suffering, but it frames our problem in a rational way and sometimes makes them more tolerable. People have been thinking about approaches to the same everyday problems for thousands of years.

OJFord 6y ago

> This comic seems aimed at tone-deaf people trying to get others to stop catastrophizing Funny, my read was that the author is on the side of the catastrophisor, 'this is what your unsolicited advice looks like - you don't understand what a catastrophe the recipients in'. Nobody ever gets a chance to give advice to someone falling off a cliff or getting hit by a truck. Isn't it the comic itself (at least) that's doing the catastrophising?

roflc0ptic 6y ago
Totally agree. The comic is straight catastrophizing.

dplgk 6y ago

Thanks for this explanation. I have a tendency to do this and I'm not sure if it's from being a programmer, where predicting a cascading effect from a single decision is very useful... Or if I'm a good programmer because I already had this tendency. It's not great for relationships.

Hnrobert42 6y ago
I also tend to jump straight into solution mode. I found it useful to study and practice mirroring. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirroring https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirroring
TeMPOraL 6y ago
A similar "programmer tendency" I struggle with that's also not great for relationships is inventing counterexamples. It's a very powerful tool of reasoning - for a candidate solution/idea, you quickly come up with some corner cases and use them to fix the idea or abort it and search for a better one. But in relationships, it leads to exchanges like: - Her: You know, maybe let's start doing X to improve Y? - Me: Yeah, that's a good idea! But let's also talk about handling Z because without it, X will lead to less Y. - Her: [confused] Why do you hate my ideas? - Me: [confused] What? I just said I think the idea is great, it just needs a bit more consideration. And then she's sad, and I'm confused, and X never happens. Despite trying to phrase my counterexamples in a very constructive way (instead of how we do it in industry: "but Z!"), they're being perceived as a rejection. After couple of such I've finally learned to keep track of the corner cases in my head, accept the idea without the mentioning it, and only then, over time, bring up the counterexamples so that it's clear these are new problems to be solved, and not a rejection.
- codemonkey-zeta 6y ago
  Wow this resonates with me so much. I deal with the _exact_ same problem in my relationship. I've also come to the same conclusion that I simply cannot discuss the counterexamples in the moment of ideation, because it always discourages my SO. It's challenging because it's this exact quality that I feel makes me a strong programmer, and it's extremely difficult to "turn it off" when other people's feelings are involved. I do think many people attach emotional value to their ideas, and any perceived imperfections invalidate the idea as a whole. I don't have any evidence of this that might generalize, but personally I feel like I (and potentially many programmers) never attach _any_ emotional value to my ideas, because if I did then every single bug I face in my code would be a defeat rather than an opportunity to learn and grow.

maxerickson 6y ago

It's generally just not necessary to give people unsolicited advice. Even more so to people that you don't know well. You are overthinking the metaphors in the comic. They are just there to emphasize that the advice isn't doing the person receiving it any good (or is your premise that the person about to get hit by the semi will suddenly act differently having been encouraged to focus on the things they can control?).

Hnrobert42 6y ago
I agree with your points. At the same time, I sm tickled by the irony of you giving unsolicited advice about not giving unsolicited. :-)
- maxerickson 6y ago
  It could be worse. I commented on the necessity of it rather than making an active statement (Don't or you shouldn't or…), and there's no speculation about how the other poster acts.
  - roflc0ptic 6y ago
    Nah, I don't think it really qualifies as advice, just seems like sharing your perspective. Hypocrisy averted!
  - Hnrobert42 6y ago
    No worries. I didn’t think it was bad. Just amusing in a meta kind of way.
roflc0ptic 6y ago
My position is that giving bad advice is bad, giving unsolicited advice is usually bad, and that "there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so", which is to say that - when something painful happens, we suffer doubly by assigning a bunch of meaning to it and worrying about it. Even though telling an individual who is catastrophizing to stop catastrophizing usually won't help them stop (and will often damage relationships), it is nevertheless the case that they'll be better off if they stop catastrophizing. I took the time to write this here because it struck me that the people who would identify with this comic might benefit from the concept, and in a small way, hope that they can apply it to their lives to suffer a little bit less. Better than giving unsolicited advice is gently sharing mental models that you think might serve a person better, and letting them make the choice to adopt them (or not).

techbio 6y ago

Catastrophizing, meet your neighbor Ridiculizing.

Dumblydorr 6y ago

It's not zen to cram shitty aphorisms down someone's ears when they aren't even asking. Zen is about sitting, focusing on the current moment, and using simple stories and imagery from zen tradition to improve your mind. Zen is not foisting your egotistically driven ideas onto others who aren't receptive.

roflc0ptic 6y ago
Fair. I should have put "zen" in quotes. I'm involved with a Plum Village inspired sangha, and have experienced my share of well intentioned, unhelpful and unsolicited advice from buddhists (who are genuinely lovely people).

guerrilla 6y ago

I think you missed the point and as a consequence this comment is exactly the kind of advice the comics apply to. We need another panel with someone being stabbed repeatedly and a person advising them to "just stop catastrophizing" The point is that the situation is out of the person's control and is catastrophic. This is an assumption of the setup. This is distinct from the experience of the situation which is painful. Denial that the situation is out of the person's control and is not catastrophic is just handwaving it away, which is unsurprisingly not helpful. > unless you’re literally falling off a cliff [...] it’s straight catastrophizing. This is nonsense. There are plenty of examples of things that are horrible to experience and outside of the person's control and for them this kind of advice is absurd. For example, depression and mental illness. This goes for many kinds of physical illnesses as well. I suspect that may be where the author is coming from too. The implication of the comics is that the grave situation is actually real and actually uncontrollable which the sufferer actually knows as a fact. > Why shouldn’t you focus on what you can control? Why not think warm thoughts about the people you love before you die? The question is not whether they should but whether they can. There's no indication in the comics that the situations are not literally uncontrollable, only that the adviser is unaware of this fact.

roflc0ptic 6y ago
> There are plenty of examples of things that are horrible to experience and outside of the person's control and for them this kind of advice is absurd Let's say e.g. someone's father gets dementia, and they've got to take care of them. They talk about how painful it is, and you feel like you've been thrown off of a cliff. Seeing that they're in a lot of pain, I try to help by saying "Look, you just need to focus on the things that you can control. Using metaphors like that is disempowering." We both agree that this would be a terrible way to help. Watching someone you love die of dementia is a horrible experience. If someone is expressing dismay at the prospect of watching a loved one uncontrollably disintegrate, the only good responses are in the vein of "wow, that sounds incredibly painful. Let me know if there's anything I can do to help." Nevertheless! The person whose father is dying has a choice about where they put their attention. Do they spend time thinking about how unfair it is for him to work his whole life and lose his mind the moment he's poised to retire? How unfair it is that they have to take care of this person, who never took care of them when they were younger? Or instead, do they focus on the things that they can influence? I'm not saying it's easy to do - personally I find it incredibly difficult. But making the effort to calmly accept things as they are without labeling things as catastrophes has been and continues to be incredibly freeing.